Well today has been a test. Oh yes,.. A very big test indeed. I had to do many things today that I normally can’t do. My OCD curse,… my social phobia,… all tested me. But I am proud to say that I put on my big girl pants and sucked it up and just DID IT.

First thing this morning I had to bring my youngest daughter into the dental surgeons as she was having a wisdom tooth removed. As everyone knows, I don’t like public places,… I don’t like talking to people I don’t know,… But as a mother I had no choice but to take her. Things went well until I had to go to the back and get her. Suddenly I was given papers and gauze and prescriptions and instructions. The nurse was literally overwhelming me with her list of things that could go wrong. By the time we left, I was more nervous and anxious than the day I brought this child home from the hospital when she was just born! Of course I couldn’t show any of this. So hopefully I gave some semblance of a normal capable mother and shoved the poor kid into the car and couldn’t get home fast enough.

I think one of the reasons I was so anxious and overwhelmed was not only having to care for this kid which, according to the dentist, could suddenly develop a serious problem at any moment and die (well OK, not DIE actually, but to a person with severe anxiety it may as well be that serious,..) It was the setting itself. A medical clinic. Now for anyone who doesn’t already know, in 2005 I got a job working at a clinic in Newmarket as a medical administrator/lab technician/phlebotomist. (Now there’s a mouthful) I was very comfortable with bodily fluids and any other situation that could bring on the heeby-jeebies to anyone else. I took patients’ blood,… checked urine samples,.. and well, you get the drift. And I did this for 4 years. But suddenly, and I mean almost overnight, my OCD kicked in with something new. I couldn’t touch bodily fluids and everything in the clinic was contaminated and therefore untouchable. I tried to overcome it over the next few months but it just seemed to get worse. Until finally I stopped being able to take blood. Everyone there really tried to help me however they could. But I just couldn’t do it. And because taking patient samples was a large part of my job I realized I had to resign. No one actually knows this is the reason I left except the Doctors I worked for.

Anyway,… I digress,…

The minute I walked into this dental clinic to pick Hayley up from the recovery room, I got totally freaked out and overwhelmed and anxious and nearly had a panic attack. Luckily my poor charge was higher than a kite at this point and knew not a thingof how her mother was a weak ol bird. I did get her home safely though and she is recovering well. (See,… she didn’t DIE!)

Then,… and as if one traumatic situation isn’t enough for one day,… I went over to my brothers to pick up my car. He had taken the time to fix it after the shop was going to charge me an arm and a leg and my first born child. He did it for a fraction of the cost and I am eternally grateful. But he had a spare part left over that he told me to go and bring back to the auto recyclers ( ok, it’s the junk yard but doesn’t auto recyclers sound so much nicer) Now because of my anxiety I don’t talk to strangers. I don’t walk into a building, alone, to meet people I have never met,… And I especially will not be left alone with a man ~ any man ~ except my brother. But here I was, doing all that to bring these parts back. Now whether my brother didn’t know the anxiety this would cause me, or he did but felt I should anyway I don’t know. But I managed to get through that ordeal in one piece too. But let me tell you,… By the time I got home I was ready for a daiquiri and to never leave my apartment again. These ‘events’ may not seem like anything at all to the ‘normal’ person. But to me they were both a huge deal. BUT I DID THEM!

It took a lot out of me though and I will definitely need a break to just chill now. Man,… OCD and social anxiety are bitches,…